Title: Finance, Society and Sustainability: How to make the financial system work for the economy, people and planet
Author: Nick Silver
Pages: 304 (including notes and index)
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
ISBN: 978-1-137-56060-5
I wasn't quite sure what to expect of this book when I asked for a review copy. Could it possibly live up to the extravagant claims embedded in the title, I wondered. I was immediately reassured by several things. One, the publisher sent it to me via courier. Two, it was shrink-wrapped, a level of reverence for a book that I can't recall encountering with previous press copies.
Three, it looks like a proper book, not one of these vastly underwritten and oversold pieces of self-published tosh that are increasingly infesting the world as everyone who possesses a copy of Word thinks they can write. Well, I have long possessed sets of spanners but that doesn't make me a plumber or a mechanic.
Another element that caused me to smile was the list of contents. I couldn't fail to warm to a book where the chapter titles include The Archaeology of Finance, The Potemkin Market, The Sisyphus Savings System, La Grande Illusion, The Economy's Helminths (I'll have to go and consult one of my several dictionaries as I have no idea who or what a Helminth is!) and, finally, Twilight of the Gods of Finance. For an actuary and an economist, Nick Silver seems to possess an unusually creative soul.
And talk about local colour...the opening sentence about a small group of Spanish explorers in 1750 cutting their way through the jungles of Central America and discovering the ruins of monumental structures such as the Pyramid of the Magician grabs the attention immediately. I consider myself reasonably well educated, good with words and capable of creating a new metaphor, but I don't think that I would have made the connection that Nick Silver then does with said structures and Canary Wharf station.
This book is worth reading if only for its closing paragraphs.
“Finally, what should finance professionals do? I must admit that I do feel a twinge of guilt as I have denigrated the work of my fellow finance professionals, many of whom are hard-working decent people, and many of whom are my friends. It is hardly a consolation that they are not even bloodsucking vampire squids, but like worms that live in your gut and are just agents of a system governed by wrong incentives which control their lives. Oh, and they will soon be redundant.
“But finance is a powerful technology and you, the finance professionals, are the keepers of its lore. Finance can be used as a positive force to improve people's lives and to help solve the environmental crisis that we face. It is up to you smart, talented and conscientious people, who hold the detailed knowledge of the system, to change the system from within so that it can become a force to enhance the beautiful things in life; nature, social relations and human flourishing, rather than engaging in a futile and misguided attempt to reduce all that is good to a financial value.”
In short, he might have said, there is more to life than money. But I myself voiced such an opinion not too long ago in the company of some people who apparently had a pound or two to spare. And I was ordered to stop talking as I was being offensive...
If I haven't already made it clear, this is another of the growing breed of books devoted to matters financial that is actually worth reading. I would urge my readers to add it to their reading list soon.
ps My Collins Concise English Dictionary informs me that a helminth is a parasitic worm; you learn something new every day.
